Najah and Hajar and their children walked for hours to flee the bombing. As night fell, they were no closer to shelter

Beirut: The women walked for hours with their children to flee the bombing as soon as Israel issued the evacuation order for their community in the southern suburbs of Beirut.

But for Najah and Hajar and their friends, the long trek brought them no closer to shelter as night fell and Israel launched air strikes that brought thunder across the city.

“It took four or five hours to walk here because of the little children,” said Najah, 27, a mother of five, when this masthead spoke to her and others in the centre of the city.

Hajar, 25, said the friends were neighbours who chose to walk together as soon as they heard the Israeli alert and discovered there was no transport available.

The women, living in Lebanon after their homes in Syria were devastated by civil war, were among several hundred people in Martyrs’ Square in central Beirut who had no shelter for the night and were resigned to sleeping on the grass or concrete.

Young families got makeshift fires going. A few had tents. Parents sat quietly while teenagers walked around the square. Men sat and smoked. Children played, unaware of the gravity of the situation.

The evacuation alert came at 2.50pm on Thursday (11.50pm AEDT), with messages on social media giving people maps to show them where to move north. “Save your lives, ​evacuate your homes immediately,” Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee posted on X.

About six hours later, the first airstrikes were reported across the Dahiyeh area of southern Beirut, targeted by Israel because it is home to Hezbollah.

The war on Iran spread into Lebanon on Monday when Hezbollah members launched rocket and drone attacks on Israel in a show of support for the Iranian regime, and then continued the attacks on Tuesday.

The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) sent troops into Lebanon on Tuesday to try to assert control of the border, while also launching air strikes.

But the mass evacuation on Thursday sharply increased the conflict amid political tensions in Lebanon over Hezbollah and growing fears of a long war.

The Israeli army later confirmed it carried out 26 strikes in Beirut.

The afternoon alert spread panic through Dahiyeh, forcing people to move north to escape the attacks and search for places to stay, choking highways and overloading shelters.

As the airstrikes were under way, French President Emmanuel Macron said on X that he had spoken to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Lebanese leaders to seek a halt to the conflict, saying France would assist the Lebanese government in bringing Hezbollah under control.

Smotrich, the finance minister and a far-right member of the Israeli government, issued a statement on video that spoke of destroying the Dahiyeh area so that it looked like Khan Younis, a part of Gaza where buildings have been reduced to rubble.

“You wanted to bring hell on us, we are bringing hell on you,” he said on the video from northern Israel, near the border with Lebanon.

The chaos in Lebanon came as parts of central Israel came under attack from Iran, with Israeli forces saying missile fragments and parts of a cluster bomb warhead had fallen on some areas.

The IDF estimated that 420,000 Lebanese civilians evacuated their homes across the country this week. It said its strikes on Thursday night hit 10 large buildings used by Hezbollah, including the headquarters of one of its top councils.

The death toll from the strikes on Lebanon this week has increased to 123, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry. This does not include any deaths from the Thursday night strikes.

The Hezbollah attacks on Israel caught some of its own allies by surprise and deepened concerns in Lebanon about the group’s tactics and the threat to the civilian population when Israel responds.

Reuters reported this week that the Hezbollah attacks had strained the group’s ties with Parliament Speaker Nabih ​Berri, a Shiite politician who has been aligned with the group for many years.

Berri felt he had been “fooled” by Hezbollah because he had been led to expect it would not attack, Reuters reported, citing four political figures who spoke on condition they were not named.

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said on Monday that the government would ban Hezbollah’s military activities because of the attacks, but the group has supporters within the government who reject this move.

Macron spoke to leaders in Lebanon on Thursday and declared the Lebanese government was preparing to take control of positions held by Hezbollah.

“Hezbollah must immediately cease its fire towards Israel. Israel must refrain from any ground operations or large-scale actions in Lebanese territory,” he said.

Macron said France would send armoured transport vehicles as well as operational and logistical assistance to Lebanon to assist the government, and he also outlined plans to send medicine and other humanitarian aid.

“At this time of great danger, I call on the prime minister of Israel not to expand the war into Lebanon,” he said.

“I also call on the Iranian leadership not to involve Lebanon further in a war that is not its own.

“Hezbollah must lay down its arms, respect the national interest, prove that it is not a militia acting on behalf of foreign entities, and allow the Lebanese to unite in order to defend their country.”

When morning came to Beirut on Friday, the sun shone in a cloudless sky. The centre of the city was quiet. But for the families in Martyrs’ Square, there is no certainty about how long these strikes might continue and when they might return to their homes.

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